Undergarment.



W. B. ROOD. UNDERGARME'NT. APPLlcATloN FILED 1uLY 18.1912.

Patented Mar. 25, 1919.

2 SHEETS-'SHEET l.

W. B. ROOD.

Patented Mar. 2 5, 1919.

' 2 SHEETS-SHEET 2.

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WILLIAM B. ROOD, OF WARE, MASSACHUSETTS, ASSIGNOR TO OTIS COMPANY, OFWARE,

MASSACHUSETTS,

A CORPORATION OF MASSACHUSETTS.

'UNDERGARMENT `Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented Mar. 25, 1919.

Application filed July 18, 1912. Serial No. 710,162.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, WILLrAM B. Roon, a citizen of the United States,residin at Ware, county of Hampshire, State of assachusetts, haveinvented a certain new and y useful Improvement in Under-garments, ofwhich the following is a specification, reference being had therein tothe accompanying drawings.

My invention has for its object a union garment which will be closed atthe crotch, and which can be completely and effectively closed at therear so that there will be no possibility that the rear opening can gapor work open, but which will be capable of being readily opened at therear when ncessary. The undergarment embodying my invention has thesedesirable features, a-nd in addition has no superfluous material whichmay work up into wrinkles and cause the wearer discomfort. Furthermorethere are no slits or openings at or belowy the crotch which may gapopen, or whose edges may diminish the elasticity of the material at thecrotch.

The usual front opening stops at a point well above the `crotch so thata closed crotch results or the rear opening is closed by two an innerand an outer Hap, both of which are secured on one edge to acorresponding edge of the rear opening. These flaps extend fromthe'crotch to a point well above the waist and at the front aresuperposed and sewn together and into the corresponding seams. The outerflap is rovi'ded with a large lateral extension or lo e which isbuttoned to the body of the garment at one side, the line of pull beingsuch that as the two flaps are overlapped at the front they aremaintained in this position all the way through the crotch as well as atthe back.

The invention will be fully understood from the following descriptiontaken in connection with the accompanying drawings, and the novelfeatures will be pointed out and clearly deued in the claim at the closeof the specification.

In the drawings, Figure 1 is a front view of a union garment embodyingmy invention.

Fig2 is a rear view of the 'garmentshown in Fig. 1, the outer flap beingbuttoned.

Fig. 3 is a view of the same garment with the outer flap opened.

4 is a plan view of the outer flap.

Fig. 5 is a plan view of the inner flap.

Referring to the drawings,

At A is shown the body of the garment which is preferably made oftubular knit fabric in the well known manner. The front opening extendsto a point somewhat a'bove the crotch, and is closed by the buttons B.The rear opening (see Figs. 2 and 3) is closed by an outer flap D and aninner flap E. The inner flap E has its edge a sewn to the correspondingedge of the rear opening. Theedge b is sewn 1nto an upper extension ofthe leg seam c (see also Fig. 1). From the foregoing it will be seenthat the inner flap E extends upwardly on the front of the garment andforms a" fold d in the inner flap, said fold 'being also indicated by adotted line in Fig. 5. The lower extension of the outer flap D alsoextends upwardly on the front Vof the garment and its edge z' is sewninto the upper extension of the leg seam j, as is seen in Fig. l,forming a fold Ic indicated by a dotted line in Fig. 1. The inner andouter flaps overlap on the front of the garment, the edge Z of the innerfold being shown by a dotted line in Fig. 1, while the edge m of theouter flap appears as a double line, the binding or edging of the fiapbeing visible in this view.

The overlapping of the lower ends of the innerv and outer flaps E and D`at the front eHectively closes the crotch of the garment, and thelateral extension or lobe g on the outer iap tends to pull or hold theouter flap' over the inner flap so that there is no possibility that therear opening will gap open. On the other hand, as the inner and outerflaps are not secured together, and are independent of each other up tothe point p where they are stitched together (see Fig. 1) it is possibleto open the rear opening very wide, thus adding very much to theconvenience of the garment.

By forming the flaps, which close the rear openings, with overlapping11p-turned parts` at the front of the crotch, and which upturned partsare formed by folding said flaps on the lines d, 7c respectively, aneasy fitting garment is provided, and the flaps even when the larger Haps not buttoned down, thus providing a garment which is found to rbe verydesirable in use.

n That I claim is;

A union garment the body portion of Which has an open front and isprovided with a rear opening extending to about the middle of said bodyportion, or from a point Well above the Waist line downward to thecrotch, said body portion having a front opening at the crotch and saidgarment having at its rear an inner and relatively narrow Hap the freeedge of which is practically-straight. and an outer and relatively Wideflap overlapping sald inner Hap, said mesmo between said

